In Fall of 2013, community leaders and successful entrepreneurs Julia Klein and John Weidenhammer talked about the many initiatives that are underway in Berks County to stimulate jobs creation, to fuel economic growth, to ignite technology development and deployment, to encourage innovation in education and training, to enhance the delivery of healthcare and to solve many social and community challenges that are typical of communities like Berks County. Julia, a member of the Board of Trustees of the Reading Health System, shared with John, also a Reading Health System Board member, her concerns about the challenging healthcare market. They agreed that something more can be done to address the challenges of assuring that our community is responsibly and affordably served for healthcare needs . Their idea was to organize the first ever community-wide Hackathon in Berks County and to have the Hackathon have a slant towards healthcare, but not be restricted to healthcare related problems and solutions. Their goals are to provide an opportunity for innovators, developers and like minded people to come together in the Hackathon environment to tackle interesting problems and concepts and for the Hackathon to further help establish Berks County as a place where innovation and technology development happens and is encouraged. So, at the urging of Julia Klein and John Weidenhammer, an organizing committee was formed to make it happen. The committee consists of Reading Health Systems executives, representatives from the Berks County based colleges and universities, representatives from various economic development and business support organizations, university professors and graduate students, and IT professionals. It is truly a community –wide representation of organizers. The intent is for the Hackathon concept to be continued as an annual event. The Berks Hackathon at Reading Health System will happen March 28 – 30, 2014 and the venue will be the Reading Health System Conference Center. An extensive marketing effort is underway to reach college and high school students, software developers, makers, IT experts, innovators, inventors, programmers, company owners and executives who have identified problems to be solved, and healthcare professionals with ideas that need development and more.
